Dr. Habil. Phil., Prof. Maija KūleUniversity of Latvia

Full member of the Latvian Academy of sciences (Riga) andEuropean Academy of sciences and arts (Zalcburg)

Steering Committee member of the InternationalFederation of Philosophical Societies (FISP)

Phenomenology of CultureTaiwan,

Taipei, 2007

Why I study phenomenology and try to develop this trend?

a) It is the most characteristic Western philosophical trend which reflects about rationalistic approach. Rationalism remains at the background of Western

culture,

b) in the philosophy of rationalism are universal principles and search for truth. Phenomenology shows the changes in the universal principles – principles of

historicity and lingvicity (Sprachlichkeit) appear together with the idea of constitution of sense (Sinn),

c) phenomenology do not succumb to the ideological conjuncture. As a trend in philosophy it is very honest, philosophers being aware of the horrible spiritual shocks and losses in philosophy when philosophy sold itself to ideology and turned into its handmaid. The honesty of philosophical contemplation is not

merely a social or moral category (of course, it is...);

it is also a principle, i.e., philosophy should devote itself entirely to the quest for truth, disregarding

everything beyond truth or leading away from it.

Therefore phenomenological philosophy should be part and parcel of contemporary life today.

“The same actuality: to be free from ideologies – is the challenge for Asian philosophy today”, writes Tran Van Doan (Philosophy Worldwide, II, ed. M.Kule, FISP, 2007, pp. 173)

“Asian philosophy would be “empty” without a concrete content if it is only replica of other philosophical systems. It would be a simply

meaningless game of words if it is impotent in dealing with Asian actual problems (the problem of justice, freedom, equality, human rights

should be the main concern of Asian philosophy, p. 171). And it would be a poison for the young generation if it is content to be subservient to

ideology, ... Or to be a mere instrument for anyone.

The leaders of the Han dynasty had reformed Confuciaism into kind of State ideology, just as the Tang kings had used Buddhism for their own purposes. Most recently, Mao

Dze-dung has done the same to Marxism-leninism.

Asian philosophy ( and European, too – M.K.) is not and will be not servant to any one, any ideology or any nation”.

My understanding of philosophy:

The genuine sphere of realization for philosophy is in the independent and free critical thinking.

In the centre of the human world (culture) is the word which is not empty, but capable of awakening (Erweckung) the

forthcoming event. The word changes but also remains as a common thread revealing through times the true

existence of being human (Menschsein).

The existence of the human being through whom philosophizing is attained forms the basis for not leaving the surrounding reality unnamed, unperceived, devoid of

meaningful selfness.

Philosophizing comes first ...

• Philosophy is life’s live word, the reading of which requires a definite trained and scholarly level of perception and pure thinking involved in the same “language game”(paradigm). The form in which philosophizing realizes itself and the words used therein determine the concurrent possibilities of philosophy.

• Philosophizing comes first, while philosophy takes shape from its sediments in the texts, words, thoughts, and ideas. The sediments come back to life, are decoded and incorporated into the present-day philosophizing process only if the mind at work includes them in its viewing of the present ( hermeneutical approach ).

• It seems, therefore, that the possibilities philosophy has to view the phenomena of sense (the process of culture) have not been properly defined and defy definition notwithstanding the existing amount of texts dealing with the problem.

Different Ways of Doing Philosophy: Are They so Different?

• He Xirong & Yu Xuanmeng write: “Different features of Chinese philosophy and Western philosophy turn out clearer. In searching universal knowledge, a distinction between perception and pure thinking is made, and, for rationalism, the later has priority over the former one.

• To do philosophy means to do thinking training for the purpose of thinking logically with concepts. While for Chinese, becoming a sage is the aim (Ti Wu – not for translation) – it means the reflection of personal experience by both body and mind.

• Philosophy Worldwide, vol. II, ed. By M.Kule, FISP, 2007) p. 180-181.

• By different ways of doing philosophy we have got different philosophical texts. For Western rationalists it leads to first principle; while for Chinese, the way of doing philosophy leads to the description of Dao as well as telling stories exemplifying a person who has gotten Dao.

... The development of contemporary philosophy shows that the mind can think

logically, but thet the mind itself is not logical,. Mind can aldo go a-logically, ... We also need a-logical or non-logical thinking in

doing some of the humanities.Philosophy Worldwide, vol. II, ed. By

M.Kule, FISP, 2007) p. 180-181.

Philosophy as personal...

• Philosophy is undeniably personal and is based on prephilosophical nonsystematic reflection. Any philosophizing occurs on a personality level. It is connected with one’s vocabulary, literary style, mental capacity, experience.

• Style determines the unity of the thinking consciousness. In a similar manner style acts in a wider sense – determining the essential unity of the cultural period and the spiritual subjects manifesting it.

Totality of Perception and Experience?

• In philosophizing the perfection of a personality’s expression encounters the perfection or totality (Ganzheit) of perception. Paraphrasing J. Ortega y Gasset’s expression philosophy can also be interpreted as a system of mental interpretation activities arising as a result of the human being's wonder not only at life but also at the existence (or non-existence) of meaning (sense), of being, of nothing, of Universe, consciousness, body, otherness and similar concepts described in philosophy. J. Ortega y Gasset describes philosophy as a system of radical –consequently intellectual – interpretational activities arising when man perceives an incredible event: i.e., the discovery that he is alive. Philosophy is an activity rooted in human life, but inevitably rational. J. Ortega y Gasset, ¿Qué es Filosofía? (Madrid: Revista de Occidente en Alianza Editorial, 1980).

Basic concepts

• Susanne Langer, A. N. Whitehead’s pupil and a follower of E. Cassirer’s philosophy of symbols, writes:

“The formulation of experience which is contained within the intellectual horizon of an age and a society is determined, I believe, not so much by events and desires, as by the basic concepts at people's disposal for analyzing and describing their adventures to their own understanding.” S. K. Langer,  Philosophy in a New Key (Cambridge, London: Harvard University Press, 1979), p. 6.

There are some fundamental assumptions and concepts which representatives of different philosophical systems of the age presuppose. Such assumptions appear completely obvious because this is a way people are used to grasp the world.

This horizon constitutes the philosophy of the epoch.

•

The proposition about basic concepts seems to be philosophically fruitful from the hermeneutical point of view. In philosophy as

intellectual art that aims at expressing meaningful life in words, the word, the way the problem is set and the style are of paramount

importance.

The word cannot be a random word unattached to the question horizon because in that case it would not be able to carry the philosophical idea. In the process of philosophizing semantic centres are formed

which become entwined with systems of categories, problem arcs and terminological vortices.

In the centre, however, are the basic concepts, which possess a much greater semantic weight than the words removed from the centre.

General concepts of the 20/21 century Western philosophy and way tothe phenomenology of culture

• In the twentieth/twenty first century the conceptss “life” and “culture” grow in importance as generating ideas.

• G. Vattimo pointed out: “ [..] Contemporary hermeneutics seems to be only, and above all, a theory that frees reason from its slavery to the scientistic ideal of objectivity, only to pave the way to a philosophy of culture whose limits (and meaning) cannot ultimately be determined.” G. Vattimo, Beyond Interpretation. The Meaning of Hermeneutics for Philosophy (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997), p. 45.

• Language and time are coming to be clearly seen as such, because the linguistic and historical turn has taken place. And at long last among the central ideas of the contemporary Western philosophy are the concepts “value” and “sense/meaning”.

Basic concepts in phenomenology

• Philosophical words as generating ideas are not just expressed by the systems of philosophical categories described, though the systems of categories attempt reflectively and in their own time to find the semantic core and basis for philosophizing.

• For all that, notwithstanding Aristotle’s, Kant’s and Hegel’s attempts at systematizing categories, in antique philosophy one of the most generating words-concepts has been logos. Such generating ideas-words have been (and for the greater part continue to be) spirit, soul, mind, body, time, space, substance, later - consciousness, etc.

• Phenomenology is rich with the basic concepts and methods. They have turned philosophical thinking to a new way: intentionality, epoche, reduction, noema, noesis, inner time consciousness, life-world, surrounding world, event, horizon and so on.

• Phenomenology of culture has been developed as a branch which pays maximum attention to the cultural phenomena: intersubjectivity, tradition, traces, lingvicity, meaningful place, memory, fundamental phenomena and so on.

Contemporary phenomenology of culture is based on hermeneutic philosophy which grew out of classical phenomenology, and both

trends display mutual relationship.

Contemporary phenomenology finds in hermeneutics an ally that helps to supplement and unfold its postulates and basic principles explaining

culture phenomena. Hermeneutics, in turn, has much in common with phenomenology.

Thus, gravitating toward each other, they form a certain complex of problems, the centre of which is constituated by the questions of

experience and understanding, meaning-bestowal, and the existence (re-interpretation) of meaning in the cultural and historical process. The question of understanding and meaning requires understanding of their

ontological status (being a new kind of metaphysics?).

Slight differences between classical phenomenology and phenomenology of culture, based on hermeneutics

• In my opinion there are four aspects marking the difference between the basic principles of classical phenomenology and phenomenology of culture, based on hermeneutics.

• Firstly, the phenomenological method, in the first place, claims to describe the ideal meaning (that refers to early phenomenology), the phenomenology of culture, based on hermeneutical method, in its turn, claims to describe and apply the changeable historical meanings, which are realized in culture

• Secondly, classic phenomenology deals with the description of the meaning-bestowing activity of consciousness while in phenomenology of culture the meaning-elucidating activity of consciousness (the cultural subject, interpreter, etc.) comes to the fore.

Slight differences between classical phenomenology and phenomenology of culture, based on hermeneutics

• Thirdly, there is a difference between the orientation of the phenomenological method towards the consciousness of the transcendental Ego that constitutes meaning explication and the orientation of the phenomenology of culture on being-in-the-culture explication, which appears via texts and fundamental phenomena.

• Fourthly, the later Husserl’s phenomenology aspires to discover the

a priori structures of the Lebenswelt turning to subjectivity • while phenomenology of culture deals with the description of the

Lebenswelt of historical experience turning to the ontological being of language and describing fundamental phenomena which exist beyound language.

Old questions in a new way

• The history of transformation of phenomenology and the emergence of contemporary phenomenology of culture shows

• that process of culture realized through language (in a wide sense) has become one of the central issues in contemporary philosophy.

• It is through language that the most striking tendencies of our time are brought to light: first, the increasing significance of mediation (Vermittlung) in human life leads to the distinction between discourse and system.

• Hence the opposition of the word and silence, speech and language, truthfulness and lip service, solitude and communication become important questions for contemporary phenomenology.

• The next dichotomy is that of universality and individualization (concretization) of culture realized in language.

• It poses the question asked since as far back as Kant’s times: how is subjective universality possible? What are phenomena which unite us as human beings in culture?

Leaving the transcendental subjectivity

• P. Ricoeur reminds that phenomenology, which discovered intentionality in philosophy, later on underestimated its own discovery and overlooked the fact that consciousness is pervaded with meaning (sense) that in principle is outside or beyond it. It should be taken into account that in the history of phenomenology the question of meaning in itself (Bedeutung an sich) has repeatedly sprung up anew.

• By discussing meaning in itself and specific phenomena (fundamental phenomena) which transcend human culture and meaning bestowing acts and at the same time are interywinned with them

• Contemporary phenomenology of culture moves away from the theory of transcendental subjectivity.

Contemporary phenomenology of culture is the borderline where the classical Husserlian phenomenology

transforms into other trends or realizes the limits of its possibilities. The most striking example of

phenomenological transformation is its incorporation into interdisciplinary dialogue between cultures.

Speaking on the possibility borderlines of phenomenology I wondered if there were phenomena that defied description

by means of classical phenomenology, i.e., such that are perceived and interpreted, yet at the same time

surpassing consciousness and independent of it, representing the phenomena of nature and Cosmos.

I named these phenomena the fundamentals of the Universe. (M.Kule. Phenomenology and Culture, Riga:

FSI, 2002) These phenomena being the Fundamental phenomena and

beyond conscious human life and understanding

are common for all people notwithstanding of their nationalities, speaking languages, religions, philosophies,

politics and so on. But they have been interpreted differently in different

cultures.

In characterizing these phenomena one cannot do without metaphysics (in the wide sense), a way of philosophizing

that could speak not only of the subject and transcendental Ego, but also about the Universe that is independent of

the humans.

New phenomenological approach moves over from the description of the structures of consciousness and research

into human existence to the description of the common meaningful fields of

everyday life in which individual egos are not strictly differentiated.

It is our life in the Universe. Such a life is based on the fundamentals or superhuman phenomena.

Classical phenomenology (except - M.Scheler – The Situation of the human being in Cosmoss) has not

described Fundamental phenomena.

Fundamentals of the Universe: phenomenological approach

• The communal does not emerge just because in the structures of individual consciousness or existence there is a basis for its appearance. The deepest levels of the communal are the fundamentals of the Universe.

• The human being ventures forth by speaking and creating meanings into the density of the preexistent world, which is familiar to him or her, but always stays beyond the human.

• We cannot ultimately specify the fundamentals upon which we hold that our meanings are valid and our knowledge is true. Being committed to such fundamentals, we are projecting ourselves to what we believe to be true or valid through these fundamentals.

• We cannot first see what they are and look at them since we are looking (hearing) with them.

The background for meaningful reality is created by such

phenomena of the Universe as rhythm, light, darkness, silence,

noise, and meaingful place. Phenomenology of culture

analyzing such extraordinary phenomena gives basis for an

interdisciplinary dialogue between cultures.

That is why the ontological pre-conditions of understanding and meaning should be sought not only in human mind and volition creating culture,

but also in the Universe as a whole.

French philosopher Emmanuel Levinas has a similar orientation: “The cultural action expresses not a preexisting thought but being, to which, as

incarnate, it belongs already."

Phenomena such as light, darkness, silence, noise, rhythm, space function as the basis of the intersubjective processes of life. Silence and noise are not only and solely phenomena created by

culture, but phenomena necessary for life and living.

Just like light-darkness, silence and noise, too, are phenomena whose scope reaches out from nature, from phenomena created by the

Universe up to the phenomena depicted in art and symbolic reality.

The intersubjectivity of everyday life could be the level at which those unique phenomena could be grasped in interconnection without

severing the natural and the cosmic from the symbolic and the social. It is on the level of everyday life that these fundamentals appear as the

most essential phenomena forming human existence.

It is very characteristic that in the contemporary Western philosophy symbolical, cultural layer appears already as

severed from the natural (life, existence) layer.

Phenomenology in description of fundamentals of the Universe tries to avoid it. And what is most significant, that on the level of everyday life the cultural phenomena are not separated from the universal, cosmic, natural processes.

Biological, natural merges with the symbolical, aesthetical. It is of interest that contemporary art tends to overcome this

severance by streaming into life activities, “leaving art museums and going out into the streets”, turning to vital

human values and the fundamentals of the Universe.

The new grasp in adjoining the phenomena of life and the naturally – cosmic view is especially gratifying: the human being is returned to the harmonious interconnection with

nature,Universe, with everything what exists. The dialogue among cultures becomes possible on the deepest basis of life and

Universe. The thesis on the omnipotence of the human being, cherished by the Western philosophy of subjectivity

is being softened.

Solipsisim jeopardizing the theory of intersubjectivity in phenomenology is being cancelled as, according to Leibnitz, man is a microcosm in macrocosm. The

foundations of intersubjectivity are also changing. They needn’t be sought and found only and solely in the

disintegrated social reality, in the fight for cultural pluralism and incompatibility of discourse.

Phenomenology of culture as eco-philosophy

• In the first place, the world of the human being is united by being in the world, the ecophilosophical view, human responsibility for everything what is alive.

That is the philosophy of solidarity not only in the world of the human being but also the solidarity created by fitting in with the universal light, silence, place and rhythm.

• Contemporary conception of Eco-ethics is developed by the Japanese philosopher T. Imamichi. See: Acta Institutionis Philosophiae et Aestheticae, vol. 1–20, Tokyo, Japan.

Silence as cultural phenomenon

• The human being lives in a world of silence. The word, the sound and the voice only seem to be decisive. In fact, they only fill silence, express it, carry a message and announce the thought. Silence is deeper; silence is the foundation. The voice is a reflection.

• The voice carries the thought out, while silence goes in. Silence envelops the origins of our being, the mystery of our conception in a total unfathomable darkness.

• Silence envelops our end, our going away. Only in the middle is there voice and sound, trembling, feigning, eagerness to live and escape the silence of being, our beginning and end. The voice expresses us while silence creates.

Silence

• Martin Heidegger being one of the best Western phenomenologists, has mentioned that the Universe manifests itself at a much deeper level than the verbal one. The experience in which meaning is realized contains not only verbal but also sensual, volitional, and

other manifestations of life.

• Western writer Aldous Huxley in The Perennial Philosophy writes: “The goods of eternity cannot be had except by giving up at least a little of our time to silently waiting for them. This means that the life, in which ethical expenditure is balanced by spiritual income, must be a life in which action alternates with repose, speech with alertly passive silence.”

Phenomenology speaks about the intercultural dialogue which is possible on the basis of mutual respect, on

understanding that we – everything-what-is-alive are the part of universal life processes.

Our existence is based on the fundamentals of the Universe. Even in silence we are not completely alone

though we are rid of the market clamour, the falsehood of language, the fickleness of thought, the frailty of the will.

When we start hearing silence, we hear ourselves and our will strains itself in excitement and longing. Yet, the longing is vain, we shall discover only what we have put in. To hear

is to be able to listen. And to listen means to be able to create in the same tonality (only in the “voice” of silence) in

which the words are spoken.

Light as cultural phenomenon and not only ...

• Light is other important fundamental of the Universe. Western philosophy has became "okularocentric" (orientated to eyes) with the idea to catch the world as a written text, as "the look". But light plays much more important role at the human life.

• Our world exists because of light. But people cherish the delusion that they themselves constitute the basis of existence: their activity, their industry, and their will to power, energy, electricity etc .

Light manifests itself both as a part of the world of nature and the precondition of life, the primogenital factor of life;

both as the manifestation of Lebenswelt and poetic vision.

Light is a most essential phenomenon shared by all living beings. Light exists in the physical nature and is created as

a human condition; it is also perceived in a symbolic

context as a metaphor of light.

For a long time Western philosophy used to view these unique phenomena in very different ways. On the one

hand, it was clear that they belong to the province of natural sciences (theory of optics, etc.), and on the other hand, philosophy began to discuss them proceeding from the history of culture point of view, i.e., accentuating their

definite symbolic features.

Both approaches are acceptable. However, the most essential shortcoming has always been that they are

incompatible in principle and speak of completely different things.

They belong to different discourses, one relating to natural science and the other to the cultures.

Phenomenology of culture and world communication of philosophers

• Contemporary phenomenology marks the special traits of these phenomena: they are basic, not subjected to the human being. One could even say: they are cosmic. Yet they are also irrefutably human phenomena, belonging the human world, possessing powerful community-forming traits.

• The more cosmic to our ear sound such phenomena as light, darkness, silence, the more they aesthetisize our everyday life and impart that sense of community which the various intersubjectivity theories find so hard to discover.

• Phenomenology discussing fundamentals of the Universe gives the new basis for interdisciplinaly dialogue and understanding between cultures and world philosophers.